"Now does my project gather to a head: my charms crack not: my spirits obey, and time goes upright with his carriage. How's the day?"
"On the sixth hour, at which time, my lord, you said our work should cease."
He hoped it would cease soon. Prospero and Ariel had left and seemingly turned right around and come back on. He wasn't sure if time had passed, or the space had changed, or if the author was simply lazy.
He did know that it was getting late. The evening sun stenciled the windows on the floor. The divide between the light and shadows was so sharp he felt he could have touched it, but he sat still and watched the dust motes wink in and out of existence.
"They cannot budge till your release. The King, his brother, and yours abide all three distracted."
Ariel explained the royal's predicament as another memory came knocking. Bruce Wayne again. In his cell. In The Pit. Suffering.
Like he had.
He pushed that thought away.
"Him that you termed, sir, the good old lord Gonzalo, his tears runs down his beard like winter's drops from eaves of reeds."
Many people mourned the loss of Batman. The chalk bats on the city's walls and roofs and sidewalks attested to that. He imagined whatever friends Wayne had also mourned. He knew of only one person who wept. Selina Kyle.
She did it privately and quietly. She ruled a neighborhood. She could hardly afford to be in his bad books. Still, she couldn't keep her guard up all the time. He gave her her privacy. Her tears mattered little. And it would have felt spiteful to punish her.
"Your charm so strongly works 'em that if you now beheld them, your affections would become tender."
Tender affections. When was the last time he had those? Decades ago—No. Wait.
Two hours ago.
On his way to the play.
He saw a child by the park. He was clawing at the ground collecting acorns. The month before the nuts had been plentiful enough, but as winter came nearer they became scarcer. Any who depended on them for food starved. The boy was not far from joining his peers.
He had not done anything, just kept walking. He knew things like that would happen. People would die, and children were people. He hadn't really imagined it though. Not really.
"Dost thou think so, spirit?"
"Mine would, sir, were I human."
Everything stopped. He saw people holding their breaths, leaning forward, staring. Everything hung on what Prospero did next. He didn't know why, but everyone else in the audience seemed very sure that the world turned on Prospero's words.
It made sense. Prospero sought revenge. Ariel helped Prospero. That was the plot. Pity was not a part of the plot. It didn't belong. But there it was. And no one knew what to do with it.
That wasn't entirely true. Miranda had pity. From the start she had compassion for everyone. But she wasn't there.
"And mine shall. Hast thou (which art but air) a touch, a feeling of their afflictions, and shall not myself, one of their kind, that relish all as sharply, passion as they, be kindlier moved then thou art?"
Bane heard, saw, and felt the room relax.
There it was. Compassion. It came so abruptly. It felt like a splash of water to the face, or spring pushing through snow, or lightening.
But it was so simple. Anyone could choose at any time to do anything. Prospero chose to forgive. It was natural and unnatural all at once. He found himself wondering if he could do that. If he could gather his mess, turn his back, and leave Gotham.
No. Of course he couldn't. But he wondered all the same.
How could they do that? How could these actors seek vengeance one minute and forgiveness the next and still pull an audience along behind them? It wasn't real. They hadn't experienced any of this. But if he didn't remind himself of that constantly the truth would slip away and the play would slip in to replace it.
And now memory forced its way into the mix. The memory of a small child in a dark and empty place.
"The rarer Action is in virtue, than in vengeance."
The actress looked him right in the eye. No passion this time or apology. Just a statement.
And he believed. He believed in vengeance and forgiveness, in hatred and pity.
He could. He was capable of everything Prospero did. He was Prospero. It was his choice.
"Ye elves of hills, brooks, standing lakes and groves."
The silence brought Bane back to the room. He could have heard a pin drop if a pin had dared to drop though the heaviness.
Prospero was alone on stage once more. He reached into his pocket and pulled out the detonator. He held it out and began to cast his spell.
"By whose aid (weak masters though ye be) I have bedimmed the noon-tide sun, called forth the mutinous winds, and twixt the green sea, and the azured vault set roaring war."
Destroyed the government. Laid low the police. Taken away electricity, food, peace. Taken their world.
And they had helped. Gotham was the true source of all of it. After all, what was a wizard without his spirits?
"But this rough magic I here abjure! I'll break my staff, bury it certain fathoms in the earth, and deeper then did ever plummet sound I'll drown my book."
Pieces of the detonator went flying. Prospero tore it open flinging the batteries and empty shell across the stage. That was it. No more magic.
If only it were that easy.
Bane supposed he could. He could get the trigger from Talia, put the bomb back, and let whatever happened happen. But it wouldn't make things right. Gotham couldn't go back to the way it was. Perhaps with time, but the deep scares he gave city with would never fade. Things had gone too far.
Still one question nagged at the corner of his mind: did that diminish the act? Did that mean he should not try?
"The charm dissolves apace, and as the morning steals upon the night (melting the darkness) so their rising senses begin to chase the ignorant fumes that mantle their clearer reason."
The charmed nobility shuffled once more onto the stage. Prospero walked among them unseen, staring at the faces of agony and sorrow.
"As the morning steals upon the night." What did that remind him of? Oh yes. Harvey Dent. If Commissioner Gordon's story was anything to go on, Harvey Dent the day before he became Two Face. The lawyer had made a speech that day. "The night is darkest just before the dawn."
He must have seen the play as well.
"You, brother mine, that entertain ambition, expelled remorse, and nature, whom, with Sebastian (whose inward pinches therefore are most strong) would here have killed your king."
The corruption, ambition, decadence, lethargy, dirt, crime, lies all piled into a mass irredeemable and crying out to be destroyed. Beyond forgiveness.
"I do forgive thee."
Unless forgiveness was possible.
"Unnatural though thou art."
Redemption and forgiveness were two different things. Gotham was and always would be corrupt. That much was certain. But forgiveness. It may have deserved forgiveness. And it was his to grant.
"All torment, trouble, wonder, and amazement inhabits here. Some heavenly power guide us out of this fearful country."
Gonzalo was the first to come to his senses. He rushed to his still blinking king and searched his face for some sign of sanity.
Damn this play. It was always saying one thing and meaning another. Not exactly lies, but not exactly truth. Gonzalo spoke to whatever powers-that-be he believed in saying: guide us off this island. Bane heard: guide us out of chaos and death and destruction. Guide us out of your Gotham. Guide us home.
He could not do that. He would not do that.
"Behold, sir King, the wronged Duke of Milan, Prospero. For more assurance that a living prince does now speak to thee, I embrace thy body, and to thee, and thy company, I bid a hearty welcome."
Bane quickly stifled a laugh. No one else was laughing, but he found it hilarious. Two hours of spells, invisibility, and hiding and Prospero chose that moment to introduce himself. The wizard had been on the island too long.
"Irreparable is the loss, and patience says, it is past her cure."
"I rather think you have not sought her help, of whose soft grace for the like loss, I have her sovereign aid."
Introductions, explanations, and apologies were exchanged on stage. Bane had been able to follow it all up until that point.
Ferdinand was telling Prospero about his son's death. A death, Bane thought, that had not actually happened, Prospero already knew about, and had been explained to the audience countless times before.
Setting all that aside, what should have been a straightforward revelation was needlessly complicated by Prospero. He should have known it would not be simple. When did Prospero ever do things simply?
The wizard claimed that his daughter had also drowned in the storm.
Bane had no idea where any of this was going.
"I have lost my daughter."
"A daughter? Oh heavens, that they were living both in Naples the king and queen there. When did you lose your daughter?"
"In this last tempest."
All the life seemed to go out of Prospero. His shoulders slumped and his eyes went to the floor. Bane watched the actress' mouth twitch, no longer sure if she was pretending.
No. This was real. She'd lost someone. He'd taken someone from her.
"I will requite you with as good a thing. At least bring forth a wonder."
And in return she gave him this play.
Or maybe she gave it to herself. The whole thing was a lesson in forgiveness. Didn't she have as much reason for revenge as he? Whoever he had taken from her, didn't they deserve justice? Well, not justice.
It was a lesson for both of them. Prospero-all the other actors-chose to forgive. To reject violence and anarchy, and to put on a play instead.
"O wonder! How many goodly creatures are there here? How beauteous mankind is? O, brave new world that has such people in it."
"'Tis new to thee."
At long last Prospero revealed the lovers. They were playing chess in his cave. The King cried, Gonzalo nearly fainted, Ferdinand embraced his father, and Miranda stared in absolute awe at humanity.
He could not tear his eyes from Miranda. She beamed amazement and happiness. He knew that look. He had worn it once. The first day after his rescue from The Pit. The world was beautiful and perfect.
He felt that way again now. Who were these actors? Barely more than children, yet this was their response destruction. Calm yet rejoicing, thinking to the way to the end. He supposed it was a child's response. Still it felt like so much more. How could Gotham have produced such people? And all the people sitting and listening? Risking their lives to see this miracle.
He should have seen the city before. Should have known it.
"The best news is, that we have safely found our King, and company. The next, our ship, which but three glasses since we gave out split, is tight, and yare, and bravely rigged, as when we first put out to sea."
The actor playing Caliban came on dressed as a sailor. It took a moment for Bane to remember the first scene, it seemed so long ago. Caliban, as the sailor, explained that nothing had actually happened to the ship. Bane wondered what the purpose of the storm was if not to wreck the ship. Caliban/sailor finished his report and beat a hasty retreat for backstage. No doubt to change back into Caliban.
He saw some of the sailor's confusion in himself. The play had turned everything on its head. He wasn't thinking straight. He couldn't give up. Gotham did not deserve it. And yet…
Perhaps the spell would end soon. The actors would leave and his world would right itself.
He didn't hold much hope.
"Sir, all this service have I done since I went."
"My tricksey spirit."
Ariel was once again at Prospero's shoulder. The actor did not move like Barsad. Everything else was the same. Barsad was not a magical spirit, but the two shared a certain skill for illusion. Things could be in shambles one minute and fine the next depending on Barsad's spin. Ariel didn't so much spin as alter reality, but the comparison held.
"These are not natural events, they strengthen from strange to stranger."
He agreed with Alonso. None of it was natural. These people. This thing. Yet there it was. Playing out before him regardless of his presence. Regardless of the storm.
"There are yet missing of your company some few odd lads that you remember not."
Caliban, Stephano, and Trinculo. One more plot to tie up.
"These three have robbed me, and this demi-devil (for he's a bastard one) had plotted with them to take my life. Two of these fellows, you must know and own. This thing of darkness I acknowledge mine"
Prospero explained the trio's ill-fated plot, fighting for attention with belches and drunk jokes. The audience laughed. Bane frowned.
By the time Prosper got around to "thing of darkness" no one was laughing. The statement jarred harshly with the earlier merciful sentiments. Apparently all humans deserved mercy, but not monsters.
Not him.
"I'll be wise hereafter, and seek for grace. What a thrice double ass was I to take this drunkard for a god? And worship this dull fool?"
Caliban pulled off Stephano and Trinculo by their ears.
He deserved better than that, Bane thought. He deserved more than fleeting acknowledgement and a hasty chastisement. He had wronged Miranda. He was punished for it, enslaved and beaten. Caliban's rebellion was partly Prospero's fault. He should acknowledge that too. He should free Caliban. Explicitly. Not shuffle him offstage to herd drunkards. Prospero was leaving the island, what further use could he possibly have for Caliban?
But that wasn't the story. And for once it reflected real life. Some people did not get happiness.
"I long to hear the story of your life, which must take the ear strangely."
Alonso, so long the silent figure of mourning, was full of sayings. Strange life indeed. How had they gotten there, all these people? How had he gotten there? All of them gathered together on this tiny island to watch a play.
"I'll deliver all. And promise you calm seas, auspicious gales, and sail so expeditious that shall catch your royal fleet far off. My Ariel, chick, that is thy charge, then to the elements be free, and fare thou well."
A manic grin spread across Ariel's face. Then he was gone. Vanished behind the curtains never to be seen again.
"Please you draw near."
And then they were all leaving. The king, the prince, the usurper, the conspirator, the old man, and Miranda.
It was over.
Until Prospero turned around.
The characters appearing in this story belong to Christopher Nolan, D.C. Comics, and Warner Brothers Pictures. No profit is made of their use herein.
All quotes from The Tempest are taken from First Folio Facsimiles on Internet Shakespeare Editions.. The author has modernized the spelling, grammar, and formatting.
Again, sorry for the wait. Thank you for reading. One scene left.